Somerset

by Leila Meacham

  “I’ll make arrangements and be on the lookout for him,” Sarah said.

  Jessica threw her arms around her. “Oh, thank you, Sarah. Christmas will have more meaning to me this year, knowing we saved the boy.”

  “We haven’t saved him yet, Jessica. In this business, there’s always a chance of the train being derailed, and you can’t rest easy until conductor and passenger have made it safely to their destination.”

  Chapter Eleven

  In the library at Queenscrown, Silas Toliver threw down his pencil on the pages of columned items and figures spread on his late father’s massive desk, now belonging to his brother, Morris, and held his head in his hands. The numbers refused to lie, as did his own inner voice. He had been a fool to speculate in the Conestogas, as Carson Wyndham had unequivocally pointed out when he’d refused him a loan.

  “I’m sorry, Silas, but I’m not about to throw good money after bad. What were you thinking to invest your money in an enterprise with so many potential pitfalls? Your mistake was basing your business venture on the trustworthiness of other people to get those vehicles to Texas, take care of them, and abide by the agreement they signed, which, as you’ve sadly learned, is about as binding as a lady’s hair ribbon. You never place your expectations for financial success in the hands of other people. They’ll disappoint you every damn time. You need to stick to farming, which you’re very good at. Leave investing to businessmen like me who know what we’re doing.”

  Silas could have torn out his hair. What in God’s name had he been thinking? No one had replied to the for-sale ads he’d placed far and wide, and now eight proud, seven-hundred-dollar Conestoga wagons went begging in a field by one of Queenscrown’s barns, a humiliating reminder of his failure to turn a profit outside the realm of cotton farming. An armada of them, their high, white canvas tops like unfurled sails, was weathering next to his own wagon and the two awaiting the families who’d agreed to rent them, but what was the guarantee they’d still want them come their delivery date the first of February?

  Silas had been counting on that loan from Carson Wyndham to pay for provisions, supplies, and expenses incurred along the way. He was already leaving South Carolina in debt to the man, not an easy creditor to owe. Even if the Conestogas sold at less than what he paid, he and Lettie and Joshua would have to live on practically nothing for the five to six years he would be in hock to the richest man in South Carolina, and Silas hated that for his family. While other settlers, the prosperous among them, would be building their manor houses, increasing their holdings, adding slaves to their workforce, he, in comparison, would still be living in a log cabin minding the few acres of his original land grant with the help of his meager number of blacks. Lettie would have to make her own clothes of the most economical materials while the wife of Jeremy, should he marry, and the wives of his debtless neighbors could afford seamstresses and silk.

  But now, without the money he’d hoped from Carson, even that scant existence was beyond his financial reach.

  He had no choice but to go to Morris.

  In the other room, he could hear Joshua’s excited voice as he pointed to the pictures in a storybook Lettie had borrowed from Sarah’s classroom. Silas had left his son sitting in Lettie’s lap, his favorite place to be, under the fond eyes of Reverend Sedgewick, who sat smoking his pipe next to Elizabeth knitting before the fire. Their peaceful, happy scene jarred with the black mood overtaking him as he pushed away from the desk. He stared up at an oil painting Benjamin Toliver had commissioned of himself when he was young and felt consumed by a bitterness so intense his finger trembled when he shook it at him. “You could have spared me this, Father, if you’d only loved me enough to remember me fairly. I was your son, too—”

  “You wronged our father, Silas.”

  Silas swung around. Morris had quietly entered the room. He was a large man of the bearish build and cloddish movements that made hostesses fear for their fragile whatnots, but on occasion, his brother’s eyes were the gentlest Silas had ever seen. They were such now, and Silas thought he saw tear shine in them. He bit back the retort on his tongue and gathered up the sheets of paper. Morris had deeply loved their father. It was another offense Silas laid at the feet of the man who had sired them. He had made it impossible to comfort his brother in his grief.

  “I’m glad you’re here, Morris. I have something to discuss with you.”

  Silas moved to another chair, vacating the one behind the desk for its owner, but Morris ponderously lowered himself into the wingback across from him. “I’m glad you’re here, too,” his brother said, “for where you are, Joshua and Lettie are also.”

  Morris read his Bible faithfully, and he often expressed himself in the syntax of the King James Version. Lettie thought his tendency poignantly appealing and that it allowed a surprised glimpse into the Morris few rarely saw. Silas understood that his brother was already feeling the absence to come. Without Joshua and Lettie, his house would be barren. It did not occur to Silas that his son and future wife would be the reason Morris would turn him down.

  “No, brother. I will not help you,” Morris said when Silas had presented his request. “Your place is here at Queenscrown with Mother and me. I would give you the money if it meant that you alone would go to Texas, but I will not pave the way for you to take Joshua and Lettie.”

  “I will not leave them here, Morris.”

  “Then you can’t go, not on my dollar.”

  “And you would dispute that our father wronged me?”

  “I would dispute that he knew what was best for you. In my opinion, he didn’t.”

  “If that is so, give me the half of Queenscrown that should rightfully have gone to me, and I will—if not gladly—at least, willingly, stay.”

  “And go against our father’s final wishes for what he thought best for you? I’m afraid I can’t do that, Silas.”

  “You speak in riddles, Morris.”

  “I speak plainly what you are too blind to see, my brother.”

  Morris could not be persuaded. Silas promised him that if he would give him the money, the Conestogas were his. He could sell them to the federal army, who would probably pay top dollar.

  “Why don’t you sell them to the army?” Morris suggested.

  Because negotiations with the army would probably take months, Silas explained, and he hadn’t months, not if he left this spring. He needed money now for outfitting his rig to be ready the first of March.

  But it was no use. Morris remained adamant in his refusal. Texas was no place for a woman and child right now. Silas could stay another year, save his money, sell his Conestogas, and hook up with another wagon train next spring. Jeremy and his group would have paved the way. Meanwhile, their mother would be spared the agony of another loss, at least temporarily, and Joshua would have more time to be with his grandmother and uncle. Perhaps the memories would stick, and the boy would someday wish to return for a visit. The discussion ended with Silas marching from the study and slamming the door. Startled, the happy group gathered around the fire looked up to see son, father, fiancé, and future son-in-law stomp up the stairs to his room, his handsome face dark with rage.

  “Don’t run after him, Lettie,” Morris advised from the door of the library. “He’s inconsolable.”

  “What happened?” she asked, having been on the verge of setting Joshua from her lap to do exactly what he cautioned against.

  “His dream for the moment has been shattered,” Morris said.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Silas will not be singing the Lord’s song in a strange land,” he parodied from the Psalms in the Old Testament. “In other words, he won’t be going to Texas, at least not this spring. It looks as if Mother and I will have the delight of your company a year longer.”

  Morris strode forward and, to his nephew’s exhilarated laughter, lifted him high above his head. “Let’s go see the new puppies, shall we, my fine boy?”

  In his room,
Silas braced his arm against the cold fireplace and bowed his head. What was he to do now? Where could he turn for money? Other lenders might be willing to bankroll him, but once word got out that Carson Wyndham thought him a poor loan risk, he stood no chance of convincing them otherwise. He must tell Lettie of the pickle he’d gotten them into. She would understand, forgive him, try to get him to make the best of it for another year. Easy for her. She loved his mother and liked his brother—“a loving man, Silas, if only you could appreciate that side of him”—and certainly Queenscrown, with its gardens and acres of lawn, servants and horses and dogs, far different from the cramped manse she’d known all her life. But what she didn’t understand—wouldn’t love—was the man she married if they had to live another year at Queenscrown. That man would not be able to endure his brother’s orders—so often wrong for the plantation. Didn’t Morris know that land must lie fallow for several growing seasons to replenish itself? He could not bear to be paid a paltry salary while the profits of his labor poured into Morris’s coffers. How could he stand to be regarded as no better than an overseer while his brother sat astride his black stallion as the master of the house where he, too, had been born and bred?

  He must find a way out, no matter what it cost, what he had to agree to. He would sell his soul to pull out with Jeremy Warwick March first, 1836, as a leader of the wagon train headed for the black waxy region of Texas. He simply had to find someone willing to buy it.

  Chapter Twelve

  Eunice said, “Willie May, we need to do something with the gazebo. It looks naked as a plucked bird out there without even a bow to commemorate the season. I’ll gather the decorations, and I want you to round up some help and Tippy. We’ll need her imagination in this, and we’ll go out there and see what we can put together.”

  Willie May was quite sure she turned as white as her apron. “Right now, Miss Eunice?”

  “What could be a better time? I want every nook and cranny decorated as festively as possible before my sister arrives from Boston day after tomorrow. They’re so Puritan in their celebration of Christmas up there. I want her to enjoy a little color in her surroundings while she’s here, and she so loves to read in the gazebo.” Eunice paused. “What’s the matter? You’re looking at me with a stare as long as a country mile.”

  “Oh, why, I—It’s nothing, Miss Eunice. I got a funny tickling down my backbone, is all.”

  “Somebody just walked over your grave, Willie May. Where is your daughter?”

  “Upstairs with Miss Jessica. Miss Jessica just returned from her ride, and Tippy is helping her change for luncheon.”

  “Jessie can change without her. Would you please go tell your daughter I want to see her?”

  “Yes, Miss Eunice.”

  Willie May hurried out of the room and up the stairs. Oh, holy baby Jesus! The runaway was still in the gazebo. What in the world were they going to do? The cooking staff was preparing luncheon, and servants would shortly be passing to and from the kitchen to the Big House with items for the table in direct sight of the gazebo and storage shed. It would be impossible to spirit the boy to another hiding place without someone seeing him.

  Her heart beating so fast Willie May thought it would fly out of her chest, she paused before the door of Jessica’s room to catch her breath and gain control of her frantic thoughts. For Tippy’s protection, she and Miss Jessica had deliberately kept her ignorant of the runaway and their plan to help him escape. Willie May didn’t like to think what would happen if their scheme was discovered and Tippy was found to be involved. Thank the good Lord the mistress had given her reason to send her from the room, and she could speak with Miss Jessica alone.

  “Well, hello, Willie May,” Jessica said, turning from her mirror. “What brings you up here?” She was dressed in a knee-length linen chemise undergarment, and Tippy was lacing her into a corset to suit the small, tapered waist of the day dress waiting to be donned. A white pelerine—a lace covering to be draped over its puffy shoulders—lay on a chaise longue. The lace was threaded with red and green ribbons to satisfy her father’s desire to see the women of his household dressed in the colors of the season. No other manor house in Plantation Alley decorated for the holidays like Willowshire.

  “Your mother has asked to see Tippy,” Willie May said.

  Tippy ceased her task and said, “Mama, what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing is wrong, girl of mine. You better go see what Miss Eunice wants.”

  Tippy dropped the ties and went to her. “Something is wrong, I just know it.”

  Willie May looked into her daughter’s thin face, the bone structure, as with the rest of her body, looking no stronger than a sparrow’s, and as usual felt her heart twist like a wrung rag. She took Tippy’s delicate, pointed chin gently between her fingers. “Go along now,” she said softly. “Nothing is wrong. I need to speak with Miss Jessie.”

  Her corset half laced, the ties trailing, Jessica said when her maid had gone, “Tippy is right. Something is wrong, isn’t it, Willie May?”

  “I could never fool that child of mine,” Willie May said. “It’s your mama. She wants to decorate the gazebo for Christmas beginning right now, she said. That’s why she sent for Tippy. What we goin’ do?”

  “Oh, Lord,” Jessica moaned. “Right now?”

  “Right now. She wants me to round up some help while she gets the decorations together.”

  Jessica rubbed her forehead and paced in thought for a minute, then yanked off the corset and grabbed the day dress. “I’ll tell you what we’re going to do,” she said, struggling into its voluminous folds. “Follow my lead, Willie May, and agree with everything I say. All right?”

  “All right,” Willie May said, having no idea what she was agreeing to as she helped Jessica to button the dress. “Uh, Miss Jessica, you do know you ain’t got on the proper underwear, don’t you?”

  “Who’s going to see?” Jessica said and sailed from the room like a ship heading out to sea under full steam with Willie May following in her wake. Halfway in her rush down the stairs, the wind of her flight plastering the skirt to her legs, Jessica called loudly several times, “Mama!”

  Eunice came running. She and Tippy had been buried in a cupboard under the kitchen stairs where seasonal decorations were stored.

  “Good heavens, child,” Eunice said, meeting Jessica at the end of the balustrade, Tippy curious-eyed behind her. “Must you scream like a banshee?”

  “Mama, you don’t know what a banshee is.”

  “I do, too. It’s a female spirit in Irish folklore that sits under a window and howls that somebody in the house is about to die.” Eunice sniffed. “Though I didn’t sit in on lessons, I learned a few things from Lettie Sedgewick just by keeping my ears open, young miss. Now, what is it?”

  “Mama, Willie May tells me you want to decorate the gazebo, but if you do, you’ll ruin my surprise.”

  Eunice looked mystified. “What surprise?”

  Jessica ignored Willie May’s befuddled look. “Well, now, if I tell you, it won’t be a surprise, will it?”

  Eunice glanced at her housekeeper. “Do you know what she’s talking about?”

  “Yes, she does, don’t you, Willie May?” Jessica answered for the housekeeper. “But we were going to keep it a secret. All right, all right, here it is,” Jessica said as if her arm were being twisted. “Willie May and I decided to decorate the gazebo ourselves, without Tippy’s help, to prove to you that I do have some decorative sense. I’ve decided to take more of an interest in…​domestic things, and I thought decorating the gazebo for Christmas would be the perfect place to start.”

  Eunice’s mouth hung open. It was a few seconds before she seemed able to speak. Her eye fell to Jessica’s limp skirts. “Where are your petticoats?”

  Jessica glanced down. “Well, I was in such a hurry to head you off I didn’t have time to put them on. Now will you please agree to let me and Willie May decorate the gazebo, and you’ll stay completely
out of the way? Truly, I’d like to have something to show off to Aunt Elfie this Christmas season.”

  Her tone full of doubt, Eunice said, “Well…all right, Jessie. Your father will be pleased, I’m sure, but…” She shot a painful glance at her housekeeper. “Will you see that she doesn’t make too big a mess out there?”

  “I promise, Miss Eunice,” Willie May said.

  “And no peeking,” Jessica ordered. “We’re going to hang up a sheet to make sure you don’t. Right, Willie May?”

  “Right,” Willie May said.

  Scooter told his helpers that he needed to get off to town to pick up the wheel a little earlier than planned. It might rain that afternoon, and he didn’t want the wagon to get bogged down in the mud. They could have his share of the noonday meal. He wouldn’t take time to eat it. Would they explain to the master if he came by?

  The day, however, showed no sign of rain and all afternoon, behind a sheet draped round the gazebo, Jessica and Willie May toiled on turning the structure into a seasonal wonder to match the holiday splendor of the Big House conceived in the creative mind of Tippy and carried out under her hand. In the late afternoon, Carson went with his wife to inspect the results of their daughter’s and housekeeper’s labor and raved to Jessica, “Spook, you and Willie May have exceeded every…expectation.”

  That night as Carson snuggled next to his wife to sleep the repose of the just, he murmured in her ear, “Do you think you could have Tippy take a look at the gazebo tomorrow and…do a little rearranging?”

  “You have read my mind, dear,” Eunice said.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Other than an occasional bump on the wall, there was so little sound coming from the storage room assigned her guest that Sarah was forced to knock on his door from time to time and whisper, “Are you there?”

  The answer would come back, so soft and cautious that Sarah could feel her neck hairs tickle, “I’se here.”